Consumption and Redemption

Springfield News-Sun

Saturday, Dec. 18, 2010

It’s a season to be mindful and respectful of everyone

By Miguel Martinez-Saenz

As Christians and non-Christians alike continue to partake in the consuming frenzy that has come to be known by many throughout the world as the “most joyous time of the year,” it might be an occasion to take a moment to reflect on one of the most celebrated, yet willfully misread, stories associated with Christmas. I am referring to Charles Dickens’ “A Christmas Carol.”

How many millions of viewers will sit before a screen of one kind or another to watch some rendition of “A Christmas Carol” this year? How many viewers will be experiencing the harrowing tale for the first time? Yet, one of the most beloved and notable stories associated with Christmas appears impotent in the face of the rush to buy, buy, buy!

While the plot doesn’t have to be retold, maybe it should be rethought. Most see what they want to see — namely, a story about a greedy, crotchety old man who learns the true meaning of Christmas after he is visited by three ghosts — Christmas past, Christmas present and Christmas yet to come.

The viewer (and the reader) is led to feel that the true meaning of Christmas has to do with giving and with being selfless. Keep in mind, one of the ideas running through the novella is certainly the idea that those of us who have been blessed with some fortune should willingly provide for those less fortunate, especially if the beneficiary of our generosity has made herself or himself worthy of our attention.

Who could overlook Scrooge’s joy when he discovers he has not missed Christmas and shouts down to the young boy in the street: “Do you know whether they’ve sold the prize turkey that was hanging up there? Not the little prize turkey; the big one?”

Satisfied with his newfound feeling of (material) generosity, he tells himself that he will have the turkey sent to Bob Cratchit. Furthermore, as Dickens recounts, “(Scrooge) went to church and walked about the streets, and watched the people hurrying to and fro, and patted children on the head, and questioned beggars, and looked down into the kitchens of houses, and up to the windows, and found that everything could yield him pleasure. He had never dreamed that any walk — that anything — could give him so much happiness.”

A total transformation if one was ever witnessed.

So it goes that the Salvation Army sets up posts at every available supermarket in town and non-profits and churches the county over set up alternative Christmas markets where we can buy a modicum of redemption by donating some of our “fortunes” to worthy and deserving causes.

And so it goes that Starbucks, Target and other merchandisers announce that consuming their goods will also contribute to the well-being of those who are unable to make the very purchases we, at times, take for granted.

In other words, our consumption patterns are tied, not coincidentally, to our desire for redemption.

Like Scrooge we have come to appreciate the importance of giving back. Unlike Scrooge, perhaps, we have bought into a system that allows us to give back by simply doing what we have always done — namely, consuming.

If I buy some fair-trade coffee beans from Starbucks for my sister-in-law, for example, I am told that I will also be helping well-deserving farmers in Guatemala send their children to school.

If I make purchases at Target, I am told that a percentage of my purchase goes to charities; not to mention that my inclination to indulge in some Ben and Jerry’s “Cherry Garcia” will result in a modest contribution to the Ben and Jerry Foundation.

Like Scrooge, whose newfound generosity will do little to affect his way of life, most of us will feel better about our purchases, yet will make few sacrifices to consider the far-reaching moral of the story.

One would be hard pressed to deny that Dickens is proclaiming not only a lack of generosity of means, but also a lack of generosity of spirit — a lack of generosity that is juxtaposed to the joie de vivre of Tiny Tim, the most unsuspecting of heroes in the novella.

Tiny Tim is heroic not because he does the unthinkable in ordinary times; he is heroic because he does the extraordinary in what many of us would consider extraordinary circumstances.

His will to live, his moral maturity — demonstrated by his desire that those around him find the wherewithal to appreciate what they have been given — his recognition that happiness is exemplified by much more than the ‘things’ he has around himself and his embodiment of the Golden Rule captured most profoundly when he utters the famous expression: “God bless us, every one!” challenge each of us to consider what it means to be an embodiment of the Christmas spirit.

As discussions regarding whether we ought to say “Happy Holidays” or “Merry Christmas” hit the airwaves once again, let us remind ourselves of Tiny Tim’s spirit and message; let us challenge one another to seek happiness in what we have been given and in the non-material relations that make life truly worth living; let us challenge one another to reflect conscientiously on the idea that we can’t simply say we believe happiness consists in being with family and with those we love, all the while remaining envious of those who received more than we did on Christmas Day.

In short, let us be mindful and respectful of all members of our communities so that all of us, everyone one of us, might have the opportunity to find joy in what some of us consider “the most joyous time of year.”

In closing, I leave you with Dickens’ own Preface to “A Christmas Carol”: “I have endeavoured in this Ghostly little book, to raise the Ghost of an Idea, which shall not put my readers out of humour with themselves, with each other, with the season, or with me. May it haunt their houses pleasantly, and no one wish to lay it.”

Miguel Martinez-Saenz was associate provost and associate professor of philosophy at Wittenberg University

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